I've very nearly finished Sir Edric's Treasure. Much like Temple, I seem to have a blind spot a mile wide, and have great difficulty telling whether it's any bloody good. Temple went down well, but that's no guarantee Treasure will do so, despite the many improvements made by changes following beta reader suggestions (thanks once again to Springs and Prizzley).

Proofreading takes me a long time, although I'm running a bit ahead of schedule so far. I'm hoping Treasure will be more or less done (in terms of the text) by the end of this week, or next week at the latest.

However, it won't be released for some time. I can't go into the reasons now, but they're positive rather than negative.

Another thing I can't into much detail is a strange new project I may be embarking upon. Unlike Treasure or Temple, it won't be too long and should not distract from my impending redraft of Kingdom Asunder (my main focus, after two Adventures of Sir Edric and various short stories, will be firmly on Kingdom Asunder once Treasure's text is done).

I am going to have to thoroughly change the first few chapters of KA. In addition, some characters need more time, the plot requires rebalancing, and I'll probably have to write a new battle scene. In many ways, big changes are easier and more enjoyable than small ones. They're almost like a first draft, part 2 (draft harder), whereas small changes involve fiddling with existing scenes and chapters to try and bend them into a new shape. It can be tedious, takes longer, is more difficult and harder to assess when it comes to productivity. Writing whole new material has the handy productivity rating of the word count.

I'm considering slightly reducing the death toll. Each of the major deaths makes sense, but a flurry occur all at once and it makes the plot feel a bit lopsided. One could definitely be delayed to the next book, and might even fit better there.

However, with most major plot points I'm happy, and I'm especially pleased, at this stage, with how the two lead female characters have turned out. A couple of the chaps need more meat adding to their bones, though, particularly the Esden brothers and perhaps Sir James, the cross-dressing knight.

Anyway, even going full steam ahead I do not believe there's any prospect of Kingdom Asunder being released this year, though I shall work hard on it. The mystery smaller project, if it occurs, will be released in 2015.